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Highacres (Dramatic Reading)

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<h3>THE FAMILY COUNCILS</h3> Uncle Johnny laid Peter Westley's letter down. A silence held them all; it was as though a voice from some other world had been speaking to them. Mrs. Westley shivered. "How I hate money," she cried impulsively. Then, the very comfort and luxury of the room reproaching her, she added: "I mean, I hate to think that wherever big fortunes are made so many are ground down in the process." Graham was frowning at the letter. "Of course you're going to hunt up this fellow?" he asked, anxiously, a dull red flushing his cheeks. "Wasn't that as bad as stealing?" "Maybe he's dead now and it's too late," cried Gyp, who thought the whole thing full of intensely interesting possibilities. "Uncle Peter cannot defend himself, now, Graham, so let us not pass judgment upon what he has done. And I don't suppose I can act on this matter until your father comes home." "Oh, John, I know he will want to carry out his Uncle Peter's wish! You need not wait; too much time has been lost already," urged Mrs. Westley. Graham was standing in front of the fire, his back to the blaze. It struck Uncle Johnny and his mother both that there was a new manliness in the slim, straight figure. "I want to help find him. It's when you know about such tricks and cheating and—and injustice that you hate this trying to make money. I think things ought to be divided up in this world and every fellow given an equal chance." John Westley laid his hand on the boy's shoulder. "Real justice is the hardest thing to find in this world, sonny. But keep the thought of it always in your mind—and look out for the rights of the other fellow, then you'll never make the mistakes Uncle Peter did." "Poor old man, all he cared about in the world was making money, and then in his old age it gave him no joy—only torment. And he'd killed everything else in him that might have brought him a little happiness! I'm glad you and Robert aren't like him," Mrs. Westley added. "I am, too," cried Gyp, so fervently that everyone laughed. "How do you find people?" put in Tibby, who was trying very hard to understand what it was all about. "It will be somewhat like the needle in the hay-stack. Boston is a big place—and a lot can happen in—let me see, that must have been fifteen years ago." "Will you hire detectives?" Gyp was quivering with the desire to help hunt down the mysterious Craig Winton. "I don't want to; I've always had a sort of distrust of detectives and yet we may have to. We have so little to start on. I'll get Stevens and Murray together to-morrow—perhaps they can tell me more about the buying of the patent. And I'll have Watkins recommend some reliable Boston attorney." Uncle John's voice sounded as though he meant business. Isobel had said nothing during the little family council. She suddenly lifted her head, her eyes dark with disapproval. "Won't giving this person all that money make us poor?" Something in her tone sent a little shock through the others. "My dear——" protested her mother. "Oh, you'd go on cheating him—just like Uncle Peter! That's like you—just think about yourself," accused Graham, disgustedly. "Do you want tainted money?" cried Gyp grandly. Isobel's face flamed. "You're hateful, Graham Westley. I don't like money a bit better than you do—you'd be squealing if you couldn't get that new motorcycle and go to camp and spend all the money you do. And I think it's silly to hunt him up after all this time. He's probably invented a lot of things since and doesn't need any money, and if he hasn't—well, inventors are always poor, anyway." Isobel tried to make her logic sound as reasonable to the others as it did to her. "Bonnie, dear——" That was the name Uncle Johnny had given to her in nursery days; he had not used it for a long time. "There are two reasons why we must carry out the wish Uncle Peter has expressed in this letter. One is, because he has asked it. He thought he would have time to give the letter to us himself—perhaps tell us more about it; he did not dream that it would lie for two years in that Bible. The other reason is that it is the honorable thing to do—and it not only involves the honor of Uncle Peter's name but your father's honor and mine—your mother's, yours, Graham's—even little Tibby's. We would do it if it took our last cent. But it won't——" "Oh, Uncle Johnny, you're great——" Graham suddenly turned his face to the fire to hide his feeling. "When I'm a man I want to be just like you—and father." Isobel would not let herself be persuaded to accept her family's point of view. In her heart there still rankled the thought that Uncle Johnny had taken Barbara Lee with him to Highacres and had made her stay at home. And it had been silly for them all to get so excited and make such a fuss over Gyp and Jerry—they might have known that they'd turn up all right. When she had seen Uncle Johnny pull Jerry down to a seat beside him on the davenport she had hated her! Mrs. Westley followed John Westley to the little room that was always called "father's study." "Won't it be exciting hunting up this Craig Winton?" Gyp asked the others. "Isn't it an interesting name? Maybe he'll have a lot of children. I hope there'll be some girls." Gyp hugged her knees in an ecstasy of anticipation. "If they're dreadfully poor it'll be like their finding a fairy godmother. Think of all they can have with that money!" "All I hope"—Isobel's voice rang cruelly clear—"is that Uncle Johnny won't want to bring any more charity girls here!" She rose, then, and without looking at any of them, walked from the room. Gyp opened her lips to speak, then closed them quickly. Whatever she might say, she knew, instinctively, would only add to the hurt Isobel had inflicted. She could not even throw her arms around Jerry's neck and hug her the way she wanted to do, because the expression of Jerry's face forbade it. It was a very terrible expression, Gyp thought, a little frightened—Jerry's eyes glowed with such a fierce pride and yet were so hurt! After a moment Jerry said slowly, "I—I am going to bed." Gyp wished that Graham would say something and Graham wished Gyp would say something, and both sat tongue-tied while Jerry walked out of the room. "Do you think we ought to tell mother?" Gyp asked, in a hushed voice. "N-no," Graham hated the thought of tale-bearing. "But Isobel's an awful snob. It's her going around with Cora Stanton and Amy Mathers." To think this gave some comfort to Graham and Gyp. "Well—I don't know what Jerry will do," sighed Gyp forlornly. The door of Jerry's room was shut and Gyp had not the courage to open it. She listened for a moment outside it—there was not a sound from within. She went into her own room and undressed slowly, with a vague uneasiness that something was going to happen. There had been no sound in Jerry's room because she had been standing rigid in the window, staring with burning, angry eyes out into the darkness. Her beautiful, happy world, that she had thought so full of kindness and good-fellowship, had turned suddenly upside down! "Charity girl——" She did not know just what it meant, but it made her think of homeless, nameless, unloved waifs—motherless, fatherless, dependent upon the world's generosity. Her hand went to her throat—charity girl—was not her beloved Sunnyside, with Sweetheart and Little-Dad, richer and more beautiful than anything on earth? And hadn't she always had——Like a flash, though, she saw herself in the queerly-fashioned brown dress that had seemed very nice back at Miller's Notch, but very funny when contrasted with the pretty, simple serge dresses that the other girls at Highacres wore. Perhaps they had all thought she was a "charity girl," a waif brought here by Uncle Johnny. To be sure, her schoolmates had welcomed her into all their activities, but perhaps they had felt sorry for her and, anyway, it had been after Uncle Johnny had given her the Christmas box—— She looked down at the dress she wore—it was the school dress that had been in the box. Perhaps she should not have taken it—taking it may have made her a charity girl. She should never have come here. It was costing someone money to send her to Highacres and to feed her; and often Mrs. Westley gave little things to her—and none of this could she repay! With furious fingers Jerry unfastened and tore off the Christmas dress. From its hook in her clothes closet she took down the despised brown garment. Her only thought, then, was to sort out her very own possessions, but, as she collected the few things, the plan to go away—anywhere—took shape in her mind. She would go to Barbara Lee until her mother could send for her! Then her door opened slowly. On the threshold stood Gyp in her red dressing-gown. It was not so dark but that Gyp could see that Jerry wore her old brown dress and that she held her hat in her hand. With one bound she was at her friend's side, holding her arm tightly. "Jerry, you're not going away! You're not——" "I've—got—to. I won't be——" "You're not a—whatever Isobel said! She's horrid—she's jealous of you because Dana King and—and everybody thinks you're the most popular girl at Lincoln. Peggy Lee said she heard a crowd of girls saying so—that it was 'cause you're always nice to everybody and 'cause you like to do everything—I won't let you go!" There was something very stubborn in Gyp's dark face; Jerry wished she had not come in. Just before it had seemed so easy to slip away to Barbara Lee's and now—— "I never should have come here. I never should have let you all——" Gyp gave her chum a little shake. "Jerry Travis, Uncle Johnny brought you 'cause he said he knew you could give Lincoln School and Isobel and me a lot—oh, of something—mother read it in his letter—I remember. He said it was like a sort of scholarship. And I heard mother tell him the day I was teasing her to let me cut my hair short like yours, that she'd be willing to let me do anything if I could learn to be as sunny as you are—I heard her, 'cause I was listening to see if she was going to let me. So you've more than paid for everything. There's something more than just money! You're too proud; you're prouder than Isobel herself——" Jerry dropped her hat on the bed. Gyp took it as a promising sign and she closed her arms tight around Jerry's shoulders. "If you go away it will break my heart," she declared. "I love you more'n any chum I ever had—more than anybody—except my family, of course, and I love them differently, so it doesn't count. And mother loves you, too, and so does Tibby, and so does Uncle Johnny. And if you don't tell me right off that you won't go away I'll go straight to mother and then we'll have to tell her how nasty Isobel was, and that'll make her unhappy. And I mean it." There was no doubt of that. Gyp's concluding argument broke down Jerry's determination to go. No, she could not; as Gyp had said, if she went away Mrs. Westley and Uncle Johnny must know why. She could not do a single thing that would make either of them the least unhappy. That would be poor gratitude. Perhaps Gyp was right, too—that she was too proud! Surely her mother would never have let her come if it was going to bring the least humiliation to her. Gyp with quick fingers began to unbutton the brown dress. "Let's just show Isobel that we don't care what she says. I think it's that horrid Cora Stanton and Amy Mathers that makes her act so, anyway. They're horrid! Amy Mathers puts peroxide on her hair and Cora Stanton cheated in the geometry exam—everyone says so—I know what let's do, Jerry, there were some cup cakes left; I saw them in the pantry—let's go down ever so quietly and get them—and we'll have a spliffy spread." As she spoke she caught up Jerry's warm eiderdown wrapper and threw it around her. Gyp's devotion was very soothing to poor distraught Jerry—so, too, was the suggestion of the cup cakes. But half-way down the stairs Jerry stopped short and whispered tragically in Gyp's ear: "Gyp—we can't eat them! Our school record—no sweets between meals!" And at the thought of school Jerry's world suddenly righted again. "Oh, well——" Gyp would have liked to suggest missing a point. "We can eat crackers and peanut butter—instead." <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>CHAPTER XXI</h2> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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